Tag #128684 - Interview #99672 (Sima Libman)

Our family wasn’t religious, but we tried to observe Jewish traditions. At home we celebrated every Jewish holiday, and I often cooked Jewish food, not just on holidays. So our son was aware of his Jewish identity early on, and he never had a complex in this respect. Since my husband and I could both speak Yiddish, Russian, Estonian, and German, at home we used a bit of each language. As a result, Elkond can speak Russian and Estonian fluently and can also understand Yiddish. Elkond was interested in journalism, but Tartu University only educated Estonian journalists, so, upon his graduation from secondary school, he entered the university to study the Russian Language and Literature. His studies were interesting: at that time, a number of prominent scholars, such as Yuri Lotman and others, taught there.